Extra Credit Blog- Luck of Roaring Camp

Bret Harte's "The Luck of Roaring Camp" is an excellent depiction of a certain kind of society becoming affected by the addition of a child or infant. As the introduction describes, Roaring Camp as a city of refuge for old, haggard men known as "roughs."

The men-- numbering around a hundred-- dwelling in Roaring Camp's cabin are described as reckless fugitive types that most of us today would describe as homeless people with unattractive features. As it says in the text, "The strongest man had but three fingers on his right hand; the best shot had but one eye" (pg. 12). The importance of the description of the men lies in their character. The gritty picture Harte puts in our mind almost might disgust some people, especially after they read how they treat the only woman in Roaring Camp, "Cherokee Sal."

I disagree with the name of the story "The Luck of Roaring Camp," however. With the arrival of the infant baby later known as Luck, all of the men begin to change. All of the men begin to find a sense of meaning in their life during the time Luck was with them, and things begin to improve and thrive in Roaring Camp-- so they call the baby "Luck" as if the infant was their lucky charm like Oakhurst declared he was. The baby wasn't a good luck charm, though. The baby was a gift from above to give the men inspiration and purpose in their lives.

While the name of the child might have been created for lack of a better name anyone else could think of, I don't think the child brought any luck, it just brought a spark of meaning and importance in their lives. Things in Roaring Camp only got better because the men wanted everything to be perfect for Luck. The reason for this is they all felt like a father to him. They all wanted to spend time with the baby and all wanted the best things in the world for the baby.

As the narrator tells us about the daily lives of the men, "Almost imperceptibly a change came over the settlement... The cabin assigned to 'Tommy' Luck first showed signs of improvement. It was kept scrupulously clean and whitewashed... The men who were in the habit of lounging at Stumpy's to see how the Luck got on seemed to appreciate the change" (21-22).

The men even stopped their everyday boyish behavior by watching their language and remaining more quiet to bring a peaceful atmosphere for Luck. Towards the end of the story, I began to think the men were beginning to worship Luck as some kind of idol. When Kentuck died, he became happy to know he was dying with the baby when he said "He (Luck) is taking me with him. Tell the boys I've got luck with me now" (29). Kentuck made it sound like he was selected by the chosen one to accompany him into the next world!

The point of all of this shows that an infant or child coming into a world of men with nothing left to appreciate in their lives in turn gives them all something to live for as most fathers do for their own children. I really think that while sometimes in life I kind of go through the motions with a lack of purpose, I know if I ever get to become a father I won't rest until the child has everything better I didn't have.

Tom Sawyer

I remember reading Tom Sawyer and thinking, "Dang, I wish I was a kid again..." I was never a country boy that thought a good time was tricking people for my benefit, but I definitely was the same kid that found whatever kind of trouble I could get into and had fun with it.

Boyhood is a very apparent theme in this. In the first 15-20 pages alone, Tom gets himself into just about every common situation a troublesome boy would find. He pisses off his guardian, gets grounded on a weekend, picks a fight with a stranger, and dwells in the fact that he's not having fun with his friends. What I found kind of interesting is how clever Tom was. It's not very common for kids his age to be clever enough to make work seem interesting. He made a groundbreaking discovery for someone his age to know when "He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it- namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain." (331)

I think that's what makes Tom Sawyer such a good story; you'd almost think that Bart Simpson himself was made up after Tom Sawyer.

Yares of the Black Mountain

Davis's depiction of the north versus the south in the "Yares of the Black Mountain" is a very intriguing and controversial subject to look at. The short story features two women: a widow and a travel writer, both from New York. The interesting part is, the two women are complete opposites in their description and opinions of the post-Civil War South. All in all, in my opinion, the two women symbolize Davis's interpretation of the north and the south after the Civil War was over.

Miss Cook, the travel writer, comes off as more of a bigot throughout the story always making comments about how simple and unsophisticated the people of the South are and the lack of activity going on while the widow remains subdued and takes a positive look at the calmness of the South and the generosity of its people.

The widow is on the trip hoping her baby and be cured. While this seems to be the overall theme of the story, I found a lot of irony in it and I found the writer to be a little biased in her story telling. Why would someone go to the south become cured if the south itself is in complete shambles. I know the doctor told the widow that's what she had to do but it just seemed a little ironic that the south had lost a war not too long before the story took place.

I find the writer to be biased because she makes light of the south's situation while making the north (Miss Cook ) to be stubborn and arrogant.

Whisper in the Dark

I have to admit, this is the first prompt I'm really not sure what to say about. This might be because I'm not exactly a very open-minded reader as I normally just believe whatever I read and assume the author is telling it how it is without any underlying meaning.

When the concept of insanity was brought into the story, I believe it was when Sybil realized there was someone else in the room right above her and grew crazy with curiosity about who the person above her could be. Also, although Sybil and her mother never knew that they were in the room above/below each other, they had this connection knowing what the other was going through and almost wanted to save each other.

In terms of the concept of insanity altering my reception of the message, I remember growing frantic just reading and thinking about how awful it would be to be locked in a room by yourself with three of the biggest stiffs to ever walk the Earth being the ones "taking care of you."

If anything, the story didn't really change my perception of the mother/daughter relationship in the 19th century readings. I guess it was just completely different from the other stories.

Again, sorry I'm at a loss of words of what the right interpretation of all the questions is.

The Hidden Hand

Throughout the course of this story, I really liked reading about one of my favorite things in life- people helping people. That's exactly what my motto is in life is that people should love and help each other. So, it really pleased me to watch a bitter old man who seemed selfish and self-righteous at first end up tending to a poor little girl in New York and taking her under his wing and all of the nice things he did for her. I couldn't have felt happier for Capitol, especially when Old Hurricane bought her a pony. I enjoyed it even more when Herbert told Traverse and his poor mother that all of their grief and hard times were forever over. The entire time I was reading I even thought, "this is what I want to do with my life, help people much less fortunate than me."

So... You can imagine my deep disappointment in Old Hurricane when he turned away Traverse and his poor mother away from his life and house and you can imagine my deep sorrow for Marah when she found out she wouldn't be able to live with him. I don't know if the end of the story was the end of the actual novel, but if so then whoever wrote that book had sole intentions of depressing people.

Stowe- Uncle Tom's Cabin

There's a lot to say about the role of children and the theme of childhood in the literature we read. In most emotional/tragic works such as Uncle Tom's Cabin, as soon as we sense the presence of any children our hearts automatically drop due to fear of that certain child becoming part of the tragedy. Sometimes, we even take it upon ourselves to feel sorry for the child even when the child doesn't feel sorry for his/her self. This is exactly how a text about slavery complicates our sense of emotion towards children. We want to view them as innocent but it makes us feel even worse when an innocent child is put in the middle of a horrific time period.

For example, when we read that Eliza would be separated from her child, we all felt sorry for Eliza and even worse for the child. It's tough to imagine a child being cast off on his own into a world of slavery he doesn't understand.

The Wide, Wide World

After reading the Wide, Wide World, I gained an insightful and emotional point of view of the life of a parent. While reading about Ellen's parents' behavior, I assessed that their behavior is much like that of our present day parents' behaviors.

Ellen's mother was very strong and wanted to be very strong for her child. I have been told that every parent's worst fear is someday not being able to be there for their young and become so vulnerable that their world is beyond their control. Ellen's mother exhibited much of this behavior as she was struggling to tell her daughter how sick she was and how she had to go away for awhile.

While I could get a firm grasp of Ellen's mother's unyielding faith in God, I wasn't really able to tell much about her father. Therefor, I saw no similarities.

The way Ellen views her parents is much the same way most children that look up to their parents view them- as the all-knowing being. For all Ellen knows, her mother was the equivalent of how we view God. Ellen's dependency and relationship with her mother really has an effect on the well being of her life.

Stephen B's first entry

Hello, my name is Stephen. I'm from Dallas (Plano), Texas and I'm a 5th year senior at TCU majoring in Strategic Communications (Ad/PR). I'm a big football fan and also in the Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity here at TCU.

What brought me to TCU? I came here as a transfer student my sophomore year from Oklahoma State. Being from Dallas, TCU seemed like a good school close to home that would really mold me into the adult I want to be when I graduate. I think there are many good teachers at this school, but I think a good teacher is someone who takes time to interact and really makes sure students are learning. Sometimes that takes unique styles of teaching.

I chose to take this course because it's required for me to graduate in December. However, I hope to get a broad background of the course material and thus become that much smarter.

My personal life kind of relates to this class. I haven't taken many classes that require me to write papers. However, being an Ad/PR major for Strategic Communications, I write a lot of press releases and such in AP style. Other writing I do includes e-mails and text messaging.

For my blog, I hope to give out an impression that I'm a calm, but fun person that enjoys life. In terms of the course material, I'm honestly not sure what I'm trying to reveal in my blog. I guess I'll learn more about that as the course goes on.

I have read, understand and agree to the terms specified in the course syllabus.